Dam disaster in Ukraine: what we know
A critical dam on the Dnipro River in southern Ukraine split in two on Tuesday night, posing significant risks to the safety of a nearby nuclear power plant and surrounding communities. It was not immediately clear who caused the damage.
Ukrainian officials on Tuesday began evacuating thousands of residents living downstream from the dam in the Kherson region as massive amounts of water poured out of the dam’s reservoir, with flooding expected to reach dangerous levels within hours.
The dam is located near the frontline of the war.
Videos of the dam in the town of Nova Kakhovka, reviewed by The New York Times, do not reveal what caused the destruction. But they do show that a significant amount of water is flowing freely through the dam, indicating the serious damage.
Located near the front lines of the war in the southern region of Kherson, the barrier and nearby infrastructure were damaged during the war. Last year, Russian troops took control of the dam and a nearby hydroelectric power station. Satellite images showed new damage to a bridge adjacent to the dam days before Tuesday’s destruction.
This is reported by the Ukrainian hydropower company Ukrhydroenergo explosion in the engine room caused the destruction, which was under Russian control at the time. The power station, he said, “cannot be repaired.”
Russia and Ukraine exchanged blame.
Ukraine and Russia have been accusing each other of plotting to blow up the barrier for months. In October, Ukraine’s head of military intelligence, General Kyrylo Budanov, said Russia had rigged the dam with explosives. On Tuesday, Ukrainian military officials blamed Russian troops for the destruction.
Vladimir Leontiev, the Russian-appointed mayor of Nova Kakhovka, attributed the damage to shelling but denied that the dam had been destroyed, according to RIA Novosti, a Russian state news agency. He did not say who was responsible for the shooting.
Thousands of people are at risk.
Communities along the waterway are at risk of being flooded and washed away. About 16,000 people are in the “critical zone” on the Ukrainian-controlled right bank of the Dnipro River, said Oleksandr Prokudin, the regional military administrator.
The damage threatens to disrupt vital services of the dam’s reservoir. It has provided potable water, agriculture and cooling for the nearby Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. Concerns about the safety of the nuclear facility have previously raised the alarm.
The dam’s destruction also poses a significant risk to nearby ports and grain elevators, as well as the surrounding ecosystem, experts say.